Rodney Williams pats Austin Hollins, right, on the head after Hollins sunk a critical 3-pointer from the corner with 11.6 seconds left in the second half as the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers beat the Iowa Hawkeyes 62-59 in Minneapolis on February 3, 2013. ( Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)

In reality, the Gophers are playing for NCAA tournament seeding, not a berth, during the Big Ten tournament. The bracketologists are sure of that.

In mentality, the Gophers are approaching the conference event thinking they can’t go one-and-out and create anxiety for Selection Sunday.

“We want to take it out of the selection committee’s hands,” forward Trevor Mbakwe said.

The University of Minnesota (20-11, 8-10) can eliminate any self-doubt by winning its Big Ten tournament opener at 11 a.m. Thursday, March 14, against Illinois (21-11, 8-10) at the United Center in Chicago.

“We have to be ready to play, whether we have to win to make it or we’re locked in,” junior guard Austin Hollins said. “Whatever the situation is, we have to give Illinois everything we have.”

This seems to be the stage under Tubby Smith when the Gophers have found a spark, even a temporary one. It was Blake Hoffarber hitting a buzzer beater to upset Indiana in 2008. It was the outside-inside tandem of Devoe Joseph and Colton Iverson emerging in three wins to send the Gophers to the title game in 2010. It was Andre Hollins hitting a hot streak to beat Northwestern and leading a near-upset of Michigan in overtime last year.

Smith’s teams won at least one conference tournament game in four of his first five seasons. This time, will it be Andre Hollins again from the backcourt? Or will it be seniors Mbakwe and Rodney Williams inside? Or someone else?

After Wednesday’s practice, Hollins proclaimed he was “ready to roll.”

“I think when it comes down to the end of the year — postseason — I start to play at my best,” said Hollins, who had 24 points and nine assists in a 89-73 loss at Purdue on Saturday. “I did that in high school, as well. It’s just staying confident and staying focused. That’s the main key, staying focused.”

Mbakwe and Williams, the only senior starters, tried to refocus each other after disappointing losses at Nebraska and Purdue to end the season. They took turns with clunkers, Williams going scoreless against Nebraska, Mbakwe managing just six points against Purdue.

“We texted back and forth,” Mbakwe said. “I just told him that this is it for us. You know, being hometown kids, we know how much it means just to be able to walk around and for people to be proud of you. Those last two games were disappointments for us.”

Win those, and the Gophers would have finished with a winning Big Ten record for the first time under Smith. Instead of 10-8, they end up 8-10.

“We have to take our games to a whole (different) level,” Mbakwe said. “These next two weeks are not only big for the team, but for us individually. We know it’s the end of the road. Hopefully, we win. But regardless of if we win or not, we only have a few more weeks here to be able to put the Gophers jersey on. We know it’s going to be big for us. We don’t want to end our careers like this, being a team that underachieved.”

“We talked,” Williams said, “about we can still make this (season) something special.”

When the Gophers began the season 15-1 and ranked eighth in the country, they looked like a Big Ten title contender. Instead, they lost 10 of their next 15 games to finish tied for seventh with Illinois and Purdue.

But they’re still NCAA tournament bound, no matter what happens in the Big Ten tournament, bracket experts Jerry Palm of CBSSports.com and Joe Lunardi of ESPN agree. Minnesota has a No. 23 RPI and five wins against teams in the RPI top 50. The Gophers rank No. 2 in the country in strength of schedule.

Lunardi ranked the Gophers No. 33 overall in his NCAA tournament bracket projection Wednesday. Consider, he says, what it would take for them to fall out of the NCAA tournament field.

“They’d have to drop a dozen or a dozen-and-a-half spots,” said Lunardi. “And I don’t think losing to Illinois is enough to do that. They’re almost in better shape because they’re playing Illinois, as opposed to playing Nebraska or Penn State or something like that.”

That’s because losing to the Illini, another NCAA tournament-bound team, would look a whole lot better to the selection committee than losing to a school that won’t even make the NIT. Illinois also was a top-10 team earlier this season. Minnesota and the Illini split their season series, each winning on the road — the Gophers’ only Big Ten victory away from Williams Arena.

Both Palm and Lunardi have Minnesota as a No. 9 seed in their latest brackets. Even if the Gophers lose to Illinois, they “may not drop at all” in NCAA seeding, Palm said, and he doubts they would be relegated to one of the four first-round games that play into the Round of 64.

If the Gophers beat Illinois and then lose to Indiana (the Big Ten’s top seed) Friday, according to Palm, they could rise to a No. 7 seed in the NCAA tournament.

And if the Gophers make a run through the conference tourney, according to Lunardi, there could be a huge bump — although the timing of the title game is always tricky for the NCAA selection committee.

“That league is so good this year that if they were to win the Big Ten tournament, I could see them being (as high as a) 4,” Lunardi said. “But again, that requires the committee having a bracket in place with them winning the Big Ten championship game a half-hour before they go on the air. And history would suggest it doesn’t happen that way.”

Follow Marcus R. Fuller at twitter/GophersNow

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